Exam question 3 · English Fairy Tales, Scrapefoot, part 15: pixies eat a cow…

State the reason the farmer kept a leg-bone close by the closet door.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: reason · What happens: keep · To what, where: State

This is exam question 3 of lesson 248 «English Fairy Tales, Scrapefoot, part 15: pixies eat a cow, a blinded giant, and a fox sneaks into the bears' castle» of the books course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	State	state	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 kept	obl:unmarked
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 reason	det
3	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 kept	nsubj
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 farmer	det
5	farmer	farmer	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 kept	nsubj
6	kept	keep	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
7	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	10 bone	det
8	leg	leg	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 bone	compound
9	-	-	PUNCT	_	8 leg	punct
10	bone	bone	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 kept	obj
11	close	close	ADJ	Degree=Pos	10 bone	amod
12	by	by	ADP	_	15 door	case
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	15 door	det
14	closet	closet	NOUN	Number=Sing	15 door	compound
15	door	door	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 close	obl
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	6 kept	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	keep	past	the reason	State					vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent bone=Theme

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice

He feared the pixies

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 feared	nsubj
2	feared	fear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 pixies	det
4	pixies	pixie	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 feared	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	fear	past	He	the pixies					vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer pixie=Stimulus

Option 2

He wanted to hit a pixy with it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 wanted	nsubj
2	wanted	want	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	to	to	PART	_	4 hit	mark
4	hit	hit	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 wanted	xcomp
5	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	6 pixy	det
6	pixy	pixy	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 hit	obj
7	with	with	ADP	_	8 it	case
8	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 hit	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	want	past	He						vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme
2	hit not said to happen	to-infinitive	He not said here	a pixy				with pixy	vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent pixy=Patient with it=Instrument

Option 3

He hoped the pixies would find it and leave

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 hoped	nsubj
2	hoped	hope	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 pixies	det
4	pixies	pixie	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 find	nsubj
5	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	6 find	aux
6	find	find	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 hoped	ccomp
7	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 find	obj
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	9 leave	cc
9	leave	leave	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 find	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	hope	past	He		vn long-32.2 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme
2	find	would	the pixies	it	vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Topic
3	leave	infinitive	the pixies not said here		vn escape-51.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

He feared the pixies would search there and discover him

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 feared	nsubj
2	feared	fear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 pixies	det
4	pixies	pixie	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 search	nsubj
5	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	6 search	aux
6	search	search	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 feared	ccomp
7	there	there	ADV	PronType=Dem	6 search	advmod
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	9 discover	cc
9	discover	discover	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 search	conj
10	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	9 discover	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	roles by
1	fear	past	He			vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus
2	search	would	the pixies		there	vn search-35.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent
3	discover	infinitive	the pixies not said here	him = he		vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Topic

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/books/248-pg14241-part15/e3/